Factors influencing creativity

2.
Definitions (Amabile et al 1996)
• Creativity is defined as
• Production of novel and useful ideas in any domain
• SEE ORDER IN DISORDER
• Innovation is defined as
• Successful implementation of creative ideas in any organisation
• Creativity of individuals and teams is the starting point for
innovation
• Creativity and innovation are important
• Life is becoming increasingly complex, fast and changing at a
faster pace
• Allows adaptation, maintain flexibility and is part of decision
making
• Creativity requires originality and flexibility
• Contributes to physical and psychological health and optimal
functioning

3.
Factors influencing creativity
• Factors
• Individual level
• Group and organisational level
Category of
factors
Factors (Based on Amabile et al
1996)
Motivation Organisational motivation to innovate is the basic
orientation towards innovation and supports for creativity
and innovation
Resources Everything that an organisation has to aid work in
domain targeted for innovation including training
Management
practices
Refers to allowance of freedom in conduct of work,
provision of challenging and interesting work,
specification of clear strategic goals, formation of work
teams with diverse skills and perspectives, focus on
technology and reward and incentive structures
Group
characteristics
Norms, group cohesiveness, size , diversity, roles, task
characteristics, and problem solving approaches used

4.
Factors affecting creativity
Category Factors (Amabile et al 1996)
Organisational
encouragement
Encouraging of risk taking and idea generation at all levels
Fair supportive evaluation of new ideas, Reward and
recognition of creativity, collaborative idea flow and
participatory decision making
Supervisory
encouragement
Goal clarity and clarity of problem definition, open
interactions, support for team work and ideas,
Work group
encouragement
Diversity of team members background, mutual openness to
ideas, constructive challenging of ideas, shared commitment
Autonomy Autonomy in day to day conduct of work, sense of ownership
and control over work and ideas
Resources Adequacy of allocation indicating importance, time
Pressures Excessive work load pressure, challenge due to intrinsic
nature
Organisational
impediments
Internal strife, conservatism, rigid and formal management
structures

6.
Processes influencing creativity
• Associative process is involved in divergent thinking and
problem solving
• Cognitive flexibility-process by which obvious patterns of
thinking are discarded and new higher order rules are
adopted
• Intrinsic motivation –process where people feel motivated
by interest, challenge and satisfaction of work itself
• Creative thinking is capacity to put existing ideas in new
combinations and is facilitated by diversity of experience
and learning
• Divergent thinking –process by which one extrapolates
many possible answers to an initial stimulus or target data
• Intuition of flash intelligence- flash of a recognition that
problem is solved
• Flow- when person is fully immersed in what is being
done and has a feeling of energized focus, shows full
involvement and success and excludes other stimuli

7.
Pressures or impediments
• Two types-alpha and beta
• Alpha is objective
• Beta is based on individuals interpretations
• Positive pressures
• freedom, autonomy, good role models and resources
(including time), encouragement specifically for
originality, freedom from criticism, and “norms in
which innovation is prized and failure not fatal”
• Inhibiting pressures
• lack of respect (specifically for originality), red tape,
constraint, lack of autonomy and resources,
inappropriate norms, project management, feedback,
time pressure, competition, and unrealistic expectations

8.
Resources influencing creativity
• Time
• Original ideas are remote with respect to
original problem
• Creative ideas require time for incubation

9.
Demographic factors
• Birth order
• Middle born children are more creative
• family size
• Number of siblings
• Interval among siblings
• Family and school atmosphere
• Large families have authoritarian structures
• Freedom and autonomy facilitates creativity

10.
Process of creativity
• Every neural circuit can compute specific
information and also produce novel combinations
• More integrative the neural structure more
combinational novelty can occur
• Appropriateness is a function of higher order
structures that assess a complex and changing set
of rules or values implicit in persons culture. This
generates a selection process which selects the
appropriate idea out of many
• Four types of creativity based on types of
structures and processing modes

11.
Impediments to business creativity
(Amabile 1998)
• Business creativity-requires both originality and
appropriateness
• Six set of factors impede business creativity
• Challenge—match work to persons capabilities
• Freedom- autonomy to choose process not ends
• Resources-appropriate time and money
• Work group features—mutually supportive with diversity
of perspectives and backgrounds
• Supervisory support—in form of extrinsic rewards, praise,
foster collaboration, communication
• Organisational support- leaders who put in place systems
and processes which support creativity-support failures